Based on an Arm® Cortex®-M55 core and Arm Ethos™-U55 neural processing unit (NPU), the SR series is compatible with the Astra™ Machina Micro development kit and open-source SDK. It is optimized for multimodal consumer, enterprise, and industrial Internet of Things (IoT) workloads with adaptive vision, audio, and voice accelerators and algorithms. The small form factor MCUs have a wide range of peripherals, including multiple camera interfaces, to help minimize system cost, power, and footprint, while enabling integration into a broad range of devices, such as security cameras, sensors, home appliances, point-of-sale systems, digital signage, and battery-powered scanners.
Announced at EW2024 alongside the SL-series microprocessors, Synaptics' Astra AI-Native computing platform for IoT combines scalable, low-power computing silicon for the edge device with easy-to-use open-source software and tools, and Veros™ wireless connectivity. The platform was built on Synaptics' neural networks, field-hardened AI hardware, and IoT compiler design expertise, and further refined with built-in support for a broad range of modalities.
“We believe we are at a tipping point in edge AI, where embedded systems developers have a unique opportunity to redefine human-machine interaction through multimodal processing and contextual awareness,” said Vikram Gupta, senior vice president and general manager of IoT processors, chief product officer at Synaptics. “Unlocking this potential requires a new class of embedded computing silicon. As part of our Astra family, the SR series extends our edge AI processing roadmap with intelligence optimized for various power levels. It enables the development of cognitive IoT devices that are perfectly suited to their environment, from always-on, ultra-low-power sensing to high-performance inference at the edge.”
“Enabling ultra-low-power AI processing at the edge will revolutionize emerging applications across multiple markets, including retail and smart homes, where we are seeing increased demands for performance,” said Paul Williamson, senior vice president and general manager of the IoT business line at Arm. “With the new SR Series, built on the Arm computing platform, Synaptics is delivering the real-time intelligence and innovation needed to scale edge AI deployments.”
“Meeting the needs of future cutting-edge smart devices requires solutions capable of multimodal processing to achieve situational awareness,” said Jim McGregor, principal analyst at TIRIAS Research. “Synaptics’ SR Series of AI MCUs offers a scalable solution that maximizes IoT device awareness while simplifying integration and optimizing power and performance.”
Key technical highlights:
The SR Series consists of three MCUs—the SR110, SR105, and SR102—each with its own unique features and advantages to meet a range of multimodal application requirements. All three MCUs utilize a Cortex-M55 core with Arm Helium™ technology, operating at up to 400 MHz. The SR110 also features a Cortex-M4 core and an Arm Ethos-U55 NPU and is currently being sampled; the SR105 has an Ethos-U55 NPU; and the SR102 is a unique Cortex-M55 device. Other features of the SR series include:
● Up to 4 MB of system memory, including AON ULP memory
● Streaming audio and vision processing
● MIPI-CSI camera input and pass-through
● Low-power image signal processing
● Secure OTP, TRNG, AES-256, RSA-4096, SHA-512.
The Machina Micro kit maintains Astra's signature "out-of-the-box" AI development experience for both beginners and experts.
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